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I hope you have all had a lovely holiday season thus far, and I am sharing a little musical throwback with you since I have been remiss about updating lately. I have something else I want to share soon but I haven’t quite worked up the nerve yet.

Here’s “Auld Lang Syne” from the 2012 Christmas album Maestro and I did – it’s probably one of my favorites, and I hope you enjoy it!

Someone looking for an ATTRACTIVE FEMALE (allcaps theirs). “If you do NOT match the criteria, you need not apply.” Errr, seeing as how that’s the only criteria they list…I’m gonna go with “no.”

A paid political commercial!…that I’m pretty sure is for a candidate I wouldn’t support! (but it’s paid!)(but my PRINCIPLES)

Why do I keep getting calls for 18-year-old characters? I am so much older than that.

In other news, I finally got my hair fixed, so I’ll be booking my headshot appointment soon. YAY FINALLY YOU’LL PROBABLY NOT HAVE TO HEAR ABOUT THIS UNTIL THE NEXT TIME I CHANGE MY HAIR

In other other news, I have an audition on Wednesday and I’ve been nursing a cold for far too long. I’m done being sick, world! At least I don’t have to sing for the audition.

In other other other news, I’m working on an aria in my singing lessons now for the first time in…uhhh years? And frankly, I couldn’t be happier with that. <3 I still think I should probably get back on recording videos to talk more about that but I haven’t figured out a good place to do that in my new abode – the light isn’t great. I should figure that out soon.

I hope you’re all having a lovely week and enjoying your October so far! <3

So you know, other than the fact that I’m a ridiculous and sometimes embarrassing human being, that audition went well.

I have a feeling I won’t know how that went unless I get it, which is fine! I think it went okay – the character had changed since I last auditioned, I got to find out what the actual project is, etc etc.

I got through my recorded audition and my Skype audition as well (my laptop does not have a webcam, but I do apparently have a Skype account if you were wondering!). It was my first Skype audition and only my second recorded audition, which – blehhhh, I really hate recorded auditions but that could be because

I hate watching my face

I hate monologues/not having anyone to read off of

I really don’t think I come across well on camera facewise (I FEEL LIKE THIS MAY BE A PROBLEM?)

Since I can watch it back over I start analyzing and overanalyzing and wondering “well wait a minute maybe I can’t actually act at all?”

related to that, if I’m not pleased with a recording I do it over and over until maybe it actually IS terrible but I can’t actually tell anymore?

also, my face.

Anyway. (It’s amazing how quickly I can go from “wow look at me go! I’m doing things I’m afraid of even though I’m afraid!” to “wow I am a troll, why does anyone let me out of the house?”)

So this week, I have a singing lesson today and then an audition on Thursday. It’ll be my first audition with any kind of singing in…quite some time, actually, so Maestro has been kind enough to help me run my two cuts of sixteen bars into the ground. (The neighbors are confused, I’m sure.) Someday soon I should make a post (or gasp! a video!) about my new singing teacher and how much I am learning in and enjoying lessons nowadays!

Well, I put off updating for a bit because I actually had a (I thought) quite successful audition a little over a week ago, and was hoping to hear back from them. It doesn’t look likely, though – and may I add that I just hate that trend? Maybe that’s been the case all along for auditions, but nowadays that seems to happen for “regular” job interviews, as well. I understand that it’s uncomfortable and time consuming, but even a form letter would be nice.

I dream of a day one would get some kind of constructive criticism or feedback from every job interview or audition, but I realize that’s a pipe dream.

Anyway. I never heard back from them, which bummed me out. And it’s still kind of bumming me out! I will not lie to you! I thought I was a pretty good fit for what they wanted, but someone else must have been better.

One of the things that’s dawned on me lately is the futility of angsting over anything that I can’t change or do anything about. I can’t change my bone structure or my height. I can’t control how other people feel about me or perceive me. I can’t control whether I get a gig or not. I can’t change the fact that I didn’t start taking singing lessons until I was past twenty; I can’t change the fact that my first voice teacher wasn’t really teaching me so much as giving me an opportunity to sing. I can’t change the fact that I didn’t study music earlier in my life. Instead, what I have endeavored to do is:

Go for a run or do some yoga. I can change how active I am and how comfortable I am in my body.

Study the music theory that Maestro has given me, or practice the guitar. I can progress from where I am now, even though I can’t go back in time.

Look for new opportunities and submit for them. I can optimize the time I have now.

Practice, practice, practice, practice, practice. Breathing, singing. I can’t go back in time to convince twelve-year-old-me that a beautiful singing voice is something you have to work at, not something you’re just gifted with, but I can improve now.

It’s made an enormous impact on my day to day life, not just in my creative endeavors but in how I conduct myself in lots of other ways. I know that this is probably not something I will be able to do every day of my life – I’m way too neurotic and angsty not to have these issues crop up again – but it’s something that I am working on doing.

And as with everything else that I’ve been practicing lately, I am getting better.

So I suppose I have been kind of busy, but it doesn’t mean that I’m letting myself off the hook. I actually have an audition tomorrow (what! yikes!), I’ve been taking singing lessons weekly for the past few months and I’ve yet to write about what a transformative experience it’s been to work with someone who cares about teaching me technique and theory and explaining the Why Is My Voice Doing This things I’ve always wondered about, Maestro and I have been working out a setlist (!!!) and he’s been teaching me guitar, and I have a couple more auditions coming up toward the end of the summer.

So there’s lots coming up here on The Acting Ingenue! I do think my next trick will be to complete the “look” revamp of my acting-related internet presence. I really ought to doodle something for a header on this blog (and maybe youtube and twitter and things like that). Any ideas for that, dear readers?

Okay, yes, I realize that it’s been quite a while since an update. And I’ll have a real one soon, I promise! But for now: here’s Secret Government Eggo Project III: THE RECKONING a Standard Christmas. (Yes, the period is part of the title.) Called such both because it has become a standard part of our Christmas season, and also because it’s full of jazz standards. Yes, we think we’re unbearably clever.

I never posted anything from last year’s Secret Government Eggo Project; I don’t remember why I didn’t. I’m sure it had to do with my many and varied insecurities; I just didn’t want to put myself out there last year. Sometimes it’s just disheartening to be met with a resounding “meh”, you know what I mean?

This year, in the interests of Doing It Anyway (sort of my motto for the past few months), I’d love to share with you some of last year’s Secret Government Eggo Project II: Electric Boogaloo err…a (mostly) Disney Christmas! We also did covers of “That’s How You Know” from Enchanted, “A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes” from Cinderella, “When Somebody Loved Me” from Toy Story 2, “Part of Your World” from The Little Mermaid, and Vienna Teng’s “The Last Snowfall.” These three are my favorite performances; Maestro joins me on “I See The Light” as Eugene. :)

(Here’s a link to my Bandcamp site, where you’ll also find 2011’s Secret Government Eggo Project. Hopefully before too long this year’s Secret Government Eggo Project III: THE RECKONING will also be up!)

I hope your holiday season has been joyous and not too stressful so far, my dear darlings! If you get the chance to listen, please let me know what you think!

This ended up being a ton of work (my very first “edited” video! in that I clipped out a bit and had to stitch two videos together! poorly! and then I had to figure out how to convert it! look at me learning new things!) considering I look sickly and weird here. I wanted to get this done finally though! SO HERE IT IS!

Gosh you guys! I have been TERRIBLE over the past few weeks, have I not? I’m stealing a few minutes before bed tonight (well, when I should already be in bed, really) to update.

In short, here’s what I’ve been working on –

I ended up being called in for two more days of extra work on the same movie! Again, not really supposed to talk about it, but it’s definitely an enjoyable day’s work. I don’t know how much extra work I’ll end up doing, for lots of reasons. Maybe that’ll be the subject of my next vlog?

I had my first rehearsal for the Christmas show at the House of the Seven Gables a couple of weeks ago – I’ll be playing Beth March this time!

In non-performing-related-but-busyness-related news, I’ve also been attempting National Novel Writing Month, I started a new job!, and schoolwork has been piling up. Part of the reason I decided to do NaNoWriMo this year is that I am often better at managing my time when I’m a little overbooked (because I have to be!). Hopefully I’ll be able to do a vlog or monovlog again in the next week or so!

I also want to thank David-Matthew Barnes for stopping by my blog with some incredibly kind words. I am still a little bit beside myself!

Wow, it’s been a week and a half – ugh, and I was doing so well for a while there! I feel like I completely lost momentum over the past week. I even have a monologue or two all memorized that I could have recorded and uploaded by now. I’m more disappointed with myself than thinking anyone is out there waiting with bated breath, but still – I’m very sorry, you guys!

I was a bit busy last week, actually! Not busy enough that I couldn’t have kept on top of things, but still – pretty busy! The highlights (for this blog, anyway) were –

I spent Monday on a movie set, doing my very first movie extra work!! I’m not allowed to talk much about it (like, reveal the project name, or – I think – talk about who’s in it), but it’s a Hollywood feature film and my bum might be making its film debut whenever it is that they’re releasing the film! Hooray! (Plus, I got paid!)

Wednesday I had an audition in Boston at Emerson College for some of their student films/student film class. I’m really looking for ways that I can get footage for a reel and this looked like a great way to do that. It was an interesting experience, I’ve never auditioned for a camera before. It’s always a nice feeling to make the auditors laugh! It’s been over a week and I haven’t heard from them, so I’m left to assume I didn’t get any of the parts they were casting.

I narrowed down my song choices for the upcoming singing competition – either “If I Loved You” (from Carousel) or “Think of Me” (from Phantom of the Opera), I still haven’t quite decided yet.

Since I sort of lost momentum on finding new things to do last week, I didn’t have anything exciting lined up for this week. I’m poking around now, though, and I’ve found a couple of interesting-looking things to submit or audition for. Last week was a pretty draining week, emotionally, and next week is my first week at my new “real” job, so I’m trying very hard to keep my momentum going!

It looks like it’ll be a few more days til I get to record anything, too, unless I can wake myself up early enough tomorrow or Saturday to try and get my first monovlog* up, which I’ll definitely try to do!